This second volume in the Case File 13 series conjures up the same appealing mash-up of comedy and horror as Zombie Kid (2013). Savage begins this story just a few weeks later and provides the sixth-grade boys with a fresh Frankensteinian conspiracy to unravel. Helping them, while also annoying them, are three girls in their grade who are equally adventurous and imperturbable. Although insults fly back and forth, the two squads team up to figure out why corpses are being stolen from the cemetery and hospital. Savage skillfully mixes the perilous activity the kids get into with Nick's active conscience and plenty of gross-out moments. There is an array of horrible stenches here, ranging from Tiffany's overpowering perfume and Carter's infamous flatulence to the goopy green liquid they all have to crawl through to save a friend, but each character also reveals a strength and bravery that makes this crew, at the end, smell quite sweet.

Monster-teers

The Three Monsterteers are back and ready for another hair-raising, funny-bone–tickling adventure (Zombie Kid, 2012). The only difference is that this time, like it or not, they've got help. When bodies go missing from the local cemetery, Nick, Angelo and Carter reluctantly agree that the only way they are going to solve the mystery is with the help of their monster-loving girl rivals Angie, Tiffany and Dana. The addition of the girls not only broadens the book's appeal, but adds a humorous layer of boy-girl interaction that preteen readers will get a kick out of. It's a battle of the sexes as the mystery leads them to an unusual private school with larger-than-life (literally) students and a mad-scientist headmaster with a demonic agenda. Though the headmaster's ultimate endgame is somewhat confusing, readers are sure to get more than a few thrills as the kids band together to uncover what's really going on at Sumina Prep. The stakes are raised even higher when their classmate Cody Gills goes missing, and the kids have every reason to believe that he will meet an untimely end unless they break into Sumina Prep and save him. The best and most satisfying part about this series is that the monsters and mystery are real and not figments of the kids' imaginations. Another thoroughly satisfying thrill ride. (Funny horror. 9-14)